Rhett and Rad chat

Feeling like we might have a problem:

Rhett: Who is the most handsome guy in the whole universe?
Julia: Ummmm
Rhett: Me of course mom.
Julia:
Rhett: Welllll...I guess God can be the most handsomest.
Rhett: But I'm second place.

Why having kids is like living with an online troll you can't unfollow:

Rhett: Me and Rad's mustaches are becoming impressive.
Rhett: (staring at my upper lip) Your brown fur is coming in nicely too.

While holding his own blanket in his lap and sniffling:

Rad: Hey, Rhett?
Rhett: Yeah?
Rad: Can you toss me your blankie so I can blow my nose in it?
Rhett:

A porta-potty break at the pumpkin farm:

Rad: Mommy...are we in a trash can?
Julia: Basically.

While trying to decide what to do one afternoon:

Rad: Oh, can we watch a CVD?
Rhett: Rad! I keep telling you! It's called a DIVA-D.

After Beck preformed his newest trick...a highly noisy, enthusiastic kiss:

Julia: You're so sweet, Beck.
Rad: He's not that sweet.

During the bubonic a month-ish ago:

Rhett: Can you we go to the store today to buy some apples and chips?
Julia: No, Rad is still sick, I'm sorry.
Rhett: Well, I have a great idea
Julia:
Rhett: He can just throw up in his hands.
Julia:
Rhett...and then put it in his pockets and no one will see.

Seeing this image on a guys shirt:

Rhett: Why is Abraham Lincoln in such a bad mood?

Lastly....

Charging down the Target toy aisle:

Rad: (YELLING) MOM!!! I found my favorite pony!!!
Rad: I found HORNEY SPARKLES!!!!!!!
Julia:
Indeed...the pony's unicorn horn was highly bedazzled. 

Halloween 2K16

In years of Halloween's past, I can face the sad truth that often times I was not the most prepared holiday coordinator (remember the duck tape to secure Rad's Loki cape?) the boy's would change their costumes five times and plus, and often we were already out of candy (OK that may be me and my late night sweet tooth faults') to hand out of to the trick or treaters. But times have changed (at least for this year) and I, per the boys request, started rehearsing my Halloween surprise face every time they practiced trick or treating at our door. 

This door specifically. Toward the third afternoon of Fall Break the boys started a verrrry loud game of puppies which involved lots of barking and pretending to pee on our one and only house plant.  So,of course the next best activity was to decorate the front porch. Hence the Miller Halloween celebrations got a pretty good dose of our Martha Stewart aspirations.  Our elderly neighbor said it was "jazzy" which is pretty much the weirdest halloween complement, but I will take it.

First grade is teaching Rhett a lot of stellar bits of knowledge, most good, some not my favorite. Example? He came home one day going on about the Pumpkin Elf, think similar to the Elf of the Shelf theme, and started putting a small pumpkin/gourd acquired from a field trip in the front door window sill. I think the idea was that the pumpkin Elf would come more the pumpkin as a trick. At first Rhett was the one moving the pumpkin and faking shock and disbelief at the shenanigans. But then the little pumpkin started spontaneously moving to very random places

- the bathroom garbage can

- the freezer

- inside the washer

- my sports bra basket

Rhett's genuine shock led to me briefly consider the legitimacy of the Pumpkin Elf...till I saw Beck trotting around the corner with the pumpkin and depositing it in the shower. Good job Beck. I might enlist him to help keep the smaller holiday characters going. I think he could do some great things with the Easter Bunny.  (For the record, Beck and I have kept this a secret betwixt us and the older boys are still fully convinced of the Pumpkin Elf's realness)

That owl is giving some serious side eye. 

And finally, the costumes that made the kid's final cut.

Rad was be thee raddest three year old ever, and live his months long dream of trick or treating as Rainbow Dash the My Little Pony. Rhett was be feeling "like a real man" as Wolverine and on of Beck's favorite grunts is "Arrrgh!" and who was I to stand in the way of his verbal accomplishments, so pirate it was. I always admire families who can pull of the family themes but #toomanystrongpersonalities for that to be the case for us.

"Now I know what it feels like to be a real man mom." - Rhett

The pirate hat lasted for 2 minutes but the sword proved to be a winner. Apologies to the house who's purple flowering bush got a nice beating for about 20 seconds. And the extra large Mastiff who got a whack on the backside as Beck rolled by in his stroller. 

Half of his costume was glorified spandex when I learned that girl's sizes run smaller than boy sizes. Opps.

"Wook at my tootie (cutie) mark!!!" - Rad (Barely pictured...the lightning rainbow bold on his hoodie.)

And a few final memories. 

- Following in my always responsible parent habits (big winks), I bought glow sticks to help keep my runners safe that night. Not my most responsible moment...giving them to Beck and he chewed a hole in them, thus turning him from just your run of the mill pirate into a rave-going-pirate.

- A a solo pic of Radbow Dash...who chose to go comando under his hoodie - which we discovered half way through the night. Leaving one house, I heard the couple ask each other in not muted whispers if Rad was dressed as gay pride. I chuckled, but he's three guys. 

- As we trick or treated we ended up acquiring a few extra kiddos who herd around. Ok maybe not all these kids, but the addition of the three little friends made trick-or-treating...funner. 

Because parents 364 days a year: Don't take candy from strangers.

Parents on Halloween: Take candy from strangers. In the dark. And share with me.

Since it seems fair to say "I made you and you shall repay me with candy." Parental tax rights and all. Wink wink. ;) 

fall ya'll

It's less than a few days till Halloween and of course Mother Nature it's still rockin the 95 degrees heat wave here in the valley. Whatever. Even though the temperature needs to literally chill, Fall activities are still my favorite so we endure. And make sure we do it before noon or after 5PM.  

I took the boys to one of those super cliche but super fun pumpkin farm/hay bale establishments with little rides that sent Rhett and Rad straight to kid heaven while Beck hunted and gathered all the loose hay straws and pointy rocks he could get his little grubbers on. 

We've done this in previous fall seasons, but this was my first year solo with all three boys (last year we went with Jake and Beck was basically a bump on a log. But this year...Beck is getting extra bold and stealthy and bolty in public which is really great. I'm pretty okay with taking the kids to playgrounds myself (this only took me about 5 months after Beck was born ... I adapt to new situations beautifully) but now Beck has to be watched like a hawk. I hope you never have the pleasure of seeing me pushing our poor stroller while sprinting after Beck headed toward a pond, parking lot, street, or in front of the pony train, because it's an ugly scene that he repeatedly finds hilario. 

So far. So fun. So Fall. 

This year we attempted the corn maze which is absolutely the WORST activity if you A. Have kids. B. Have kids who run. C. Have anxiety D. It's 90 degrees out. And we hit the E choice of All of the Above. I have no pictures because the boys had no concept of staying on the path and not "exploring" and I really wanted to avoid a nightly news story on the neurotic mother of three getting helicoptered out of the kiddie corn maze. Rhett tried to seize the Master and Commander title of our troop but he has zero sense of direction (like his mother) and can be very Type A bossy (also a gift from his mother) so trying to reign him in from going into the middle of the corn was the most fun ever. 

We eventually made our way out of the maze while Rad trailed a few steps behind and every four seconds yelled over the roar of the kiddie buzz, "CUE ME!!!!!!" ("excuse me" in case you don't speak Rad) and wanted to show me yet another farm animal something he'd spotted that he wanted, "for my birthday?"

On to pictures with short captions. PS yes I was a total village idiot when I thought that the boys wearing watching longsleeve shirts was a good idea. I'll give myself a few points because when I lost the older two it was very easy to give their description and wardrobes to the loudspeaker guy. But I'll deduct a whole lotta points because it was so ungodly warm.

1. Currently a good slide is these turkeys jam. The 3 dozen times they went down it confirmed that. Beck also didn't have it so he and I went down 2 1/2 dozen times.

2. The baby chicks were one birthday request via Rad. This is right after I told him no way jose for the 9th time. Beck also thought I was being unreasonable. 

3. Gratuitous Rad "smile"

3. I'm not sure if I've mentioned it here before but the boys are big enthusiasts of "working out" and do their versions of workouts almost daily. (Truthfully their cardio would kill me.) So when they saw this strong man competition they put their bro caps on and started talking muscles.

Rhett: Do you think having a mustache will make me stronger? Cause I have one mom.

Rad: (Grunting) You. Can. Do. It. Hulk. (Calling himself Hulk. I'm assuming)

4. Now this looked fun to me. Mostly because the line was non existent, but I thought it could be a hoot to watch the boys roll.

Turned out that Rad was above helping Rhett roll and Rhett's coordination seemed to not want to participate. Which ended with me pushing the giant tube down the track and holding helpful Beck who continuously hit the exterior. Good times. Good workout. Good sweating.

5. Taking a selfie + a breather before we began our Ironmom + child out to the van.

In general the classic apple orchard/corn maze/pig race/delicious carnival-esque food good time was had. So much that Rad announced "Datt was such a FUN Halloween!" so maybe Halloween is already over. Kidding. I'm so looking forward to taking my rightful parental tax of a Reeces and all Tootsie Rolls post trick or treating. ;)

not dead

I think I've mentioned a few thousand times before that I hate not posting on the regular. Yes, even missing a week gives me a case of the violent shakes. Detachment? No - I've never heard of it and I'm not interested in living my best life with intentionality. Give me Internet or give me e-death on a padded platter. JK...ish. ;) 

Way back in 2009 I started blogging, back when every newly married couple felt the need for an online journal. I think blogging has kind of taken a backseat to other social media platforms, but I've kept it up for the past seven years and just sent all my posts (minus this years...those I'll do in December) to be turned into six books and I am SO proud of myself for preserving snippets of our family history and as I go back and read the posts, my heart swells with gratitude for the life we've been given. Our life is not exciting enough to probably merit documentation day, after day, after day in painful detail (ha!), but I believe that all the mundane, messy, seemingly insignificant hours, there is really so much that we want to remember and never forget. Truthfully that's why I hate when I get behind here. 

And speaking the mundane, messy and insignificant moments, here's one for you.

The polite and thoughtful thing to do would be to just breeze right over the little stomach bug/cough cold combo/pink eye epidemic that rocked our world the past few weeks but...I can't. I knew that with school starting the germs would get us at anytime and I'd been waiting for it to hit us and when it did it was actually brutal but mercifully swift (well not the pink eye) and since it worked it's way up directly from youngest to oldest Jake and I (youngest spouse first!) were last to be hit. 

At one point one child was sick with no appropriate receptacle to be found anywhere around us and so I asked someone else to run and grab a bowl. They came proudly bounding back with a colander. 

 God has a great sense of humor. A great sense of humor indeed.

On to better things!

The weather! (I said better, not more important. ;)) We're on the tail end of monsoon season and their accompanying dust storms which means the heat is breaking and my deodorant consumption is declining.  It's been super windy and what Rhett describes as, "wonderful weather" because he's a winter lover and hates to be hot - the apple fell far from the tree there. 

There is a direct correlation between how hard the wind blows and how much the boys wild side comes out. 

There is also a direct correlation between the gusts of wind and how perturbed Ben gets when his ears blow around. 

And the sunsets lately are UNreal. Jake usually is not on board with taking pictures of the following: food, nature, clouds, and zoo animals but even this sunset could not stop the stingy photographer from whipping our his cellular device. 

Anyway, no one has ever used the words "early bird" and "Julia Miller" in the same sentence so these sunrise pics are basically priceless. 

In my life before the boys I was an avid mountain biker and for the first time in forever, I'm not pregnant and it's not a ungodly temperature outside. 

I'm sure you were jonesing to see a mountain side selfie complete with helmet head AND lazy 5:30AM eyes and I always aim to please.

And um, it was/is awesome to be back out. If you had told me pre-kids or maybe even shortly after Rhett was born that I would enjoy a a predawn workout as much as I did - I might've believed you, I guess. But I don't think I would've fully grasped what a rare luxury it is to see the sun come up NOT because a child was overeager to great the day.

The boy's temperaments and Beck's nap graciously combined forces with the food truck gods to set up fun camp at the library near our house on Friday night(s). So we grabbed our biggest and greasiest appetites and walked down to rub shoulders with/gawk at all the cool cats from our hood.

We've learned that the boy's are only a smidgen more open minded to festive things to eat so we typically feed them ahead of time and let them get their favorite food truck treat, overly expensive cotton candy. Rad's love food. The deep fried Twinkie is mine.

There is a great family vide at the food festival. One food trucker even brought out big cups of ice water for the kids which they thought was THEE coolest, plus there were free bubble guns so that only added to the fun-o-rama.

Proof that we keep those childhood standards low, fellow parents. Niiiiiice and LOW.

More proof?

A one time dip into a bucket has turned into Beck's favorite afternoon delight. 

Letting the boys "wash" the van is an activity that I fully support because it keeps them entertained for well over 27 minutes, but Jake doesn't always agree. Getting sprayed by the hose usually dampens (ha ha ha) his mood. 

"Please make sure I'm not in the shot." 

"Delete that picture you just took." 

"Crop my face out." 

Sorry Jake-ster. The blog loves you. ;)